


Misunderstood

by trufflemores_Glee_fic



Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, Family, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-29 01:27:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11430315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trufflemores_Glee_fic/pseuds/trufflemores_Glee_fic
Summary: After his visit goes disastrously, Cooper wants to make amends with Blaine.





	Misunderstood

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, everybody! After receiving multiple requests to repost my old Glee fics, I have created a second AO3 account to do so. I hope you can forgive me for flooding the Glee pages over the next few days. 
> 
> I also ask for kindness regarding the quality of these fics. Over on my main AO3 account (trufflemores), I have written over 150 Flash fics; end result, my current work is of a higher quality than these older pieces. But I know how beloved old fics can be, and I respect that something I consider sub-par can be someone else's favorite. 
> 
> So I hope you enjoy this fic and any others you choose to read. If you choose to do so, I would also be happy to have you on board 'The Flash' bandwagon as well.
> 
> Kick back, relax, and enjoy. You have been one of the greatest audiences I have ever had.
> 
> Affectionately yours,  
> trufflemores

Cooper knew that he had fucked up.  It didn't become apparent how much he had fucked up until he stood across from Blaine on stage and realized exactly how much his absence had changed their relationship.  

Over the years, Cooper had always been close to Blaine, even though it had rarely been voluntary.  Most of his childhood had been spent pushing Blaine away, trying to focus on his own future without getting his kid-brother underfoot.  In spite of Cooper's attempts, Blaine had remained a seemingly immovable fixture at his side.  It wasn't until Cooper had left for college that he had become more indulgent, friendlier, sending texts and emails and making phone calls every once in a while to share his excitement.

Once he had settled in more at UCLA, however, Cooper hadn't had time to relay everything that was happening to him back to his family, and he hadn't wanted to.  It had been selfish, but Cooper's whole life had been centered around his abysmally provincial existence in Lima, Ohio, and family had only ever complicated matters.  Letting them go at last, being free to live his own life in a dingy apartment in LA, had been wonderful.  He would happily have stayed away from his family forever had Blaine not made the mistake of attending a school dance one night in late January.

And then Cooper had had to reorganize his life and his plans entirely because in spite of everything, family still mattered.  He had stayed in Lima for almost three weeks before returning to LA, reluctant to leave Blaine behind until he had been certain that his father would not turn his anger on Blaine.  Too often, Cooper had missed a call or a text that had later been dismissed as Dad says I need to do this or Dad says I need to do that.  It was all for Blaine's protection, of course, because being gay in Lima was dangerous.  He couldn't imagine the strain that it had put on Blaine to keep his differences hidden, as per their father's request, until eventually the debate had culminated in a shouting match that ended with Blaine taking a boy to the Sadie Hawkins dance.

Cooper had never seen so much regret in one person before.

And despite Cooper's halfhearted attempts to convince Blaine to finish out the year at Hawthorne and transfer to a private school in the fall, Blaine had caved easily to their father's insistence that he transfer mid-term.

It had been a disaster.  Cooper hadn't known the details, but he'd known from the silence on Blaine's end that he hadn't been adjusting well.  Blaine had never been a quiet person by nature, and the only times that he had ever been silent were always marked by turbulent emotions.

Before Cooper could have begun to decipher why Blaine had been adjusting so poorly to Dalton, things had taken a turn for the better.  Blaine had joined the Warblers and pulled his grades back up.  He had been positively chatty after his first competition, raving to Cooper about how well they had performed and how easy it was to fit into the group.

Assured that Blaine was doing well enough on his own, Cooper had let his attention slip and focused on himself again.  It was easy to focus on himself; it always had been.  He hadn't noticed the silence as much, absorbed in his own work, until, four years after his last visit, he landed the Free Credit Report commercial.

Maybe the visit had been too soon in light of their relationship, or maybe it hadn't been soon enough: either way, Cooper had called his parents to let them know that he would be in town three days before his flight, and he had called Blaine the night before to tell him the big news.

The wariness in Blaine's tone should have tipped him off then that things had changed.  He'd been too caught up in his own eagerness to tell Blaine all about his grand endeavors to be put off by his lukewarm responses.  Surely, he'd thought, Blaine would be happy to see him once he was there.

But as Cooper had stepped back and beheld his brother for the first time in years, standing in the door of their childhood home and a good two inches taller than he had been before, he'd realized that something had changed.  His gestures had been more curt, his posture stiffer, his every movement cautious as he had helped Cooper unload his bags.  He'd even offered to help him with his laundry, as if Cooper might have forgotten how the washer worked in four years (and he hadn't been about to admit that he had), but Cooper had unthinkingly reached up to ruffle his hair and brush off the comment like every other overly helpful response that Blaine had always had ready for him.

He'd wrinkled his nose in disgust when his hand had come away sticky with gel.  He hadn't remembered Blaine wearing as much the last time that he'd seen him; it had been only one of many surprises in store for him during his visit.

His parents had been cordial, friendly even, but Blaine had remained surprisingly elusive, confining himself to his bedroom when he had been home and refusing to invite Cooper along when he had gone to school.

Gallantly undeterred, Cooper had invited himself, deciding that if Blaine wouldn't open up about his private life on his own terms, then maybe Cooper could initiate the conversation.  It had been fun, even, being regarded as a celebrity.  Gratifying, fulfilling, and a dozen other overwhelming emotions that - belatedly, Cooper realized - obscured the original intent behind his visit entirely.

It hadn't been about sharing his life with Blaine and having Blaine reciprocate anymore; it had been about basking in the warm glow of admiration that seemed to pour off everyone surrounding Blaine and his dark cloud of silence.  

Among his most avid supporters were Kurt and Rachel, both of whom Cooper remembered being close to Blaine.  He had tried to lighten his mood by meeting Kurt on Blaine's terms and pairing him up with Rachel during their skit at the master class.  None of it had worked, though, and it wasn't until Blaine had finally snapped and stormed out of the class that Cooper had started to realize that something was wrong.

Still, he couldn't have let Blaine's friends down when they had been so eager to learn from the master.  He had carried out the meeting to its completion, only realizing after the fact that he should have followed Blaine and asked him what he'd done wrong.

And now he had followed him onto the stage and listened to him sing.  He'd followed him and he'd listened and he'd responded, because Blaine hadn't known that Cooper had never done it to hurt him.  Cooper hadn't done it because of him at all.

Cooper had been very, very selfish, and his relationship with Blaine had been the cost.

Judging by the defeated slump of his shoulders, Blaine didn't know what to say as they stared at each other for a moment, locked in silence.

I could walk away, Cooper thought.  I could walk away again.

And it hurt to see that Blaine expected him to walk out of his life, to turn around and never speak of him again.

I fucked up.

When he took that first step forward, he could see the shift take place behind Blaine's eyes, bewilderment and burgeoning hope building behind his eyes.

This isn't about you, Cooper told himself.  His visit had never been about bragging about his commercial, even though he'd come to Lima to do just that; it had been about Blaine's approval, Blaine's validation, the restoring confidence that always came from his brother's adoration.  And it was only now that he was seeing the blind support stripped away that he realized that somewhere in the midst of it all, he had lost Blaine.

I could walk away, he thought, and instead, he took another step closer, and for once in his life, he focused on Blaine for who he was and not the Blaine who he wanted him to be.

"Best you've ever sounded," he said.

Blaine rolled his eyes, the disbelief and hurt plain in his expression as he turned away from him.

Don't shut me out, he thought, stepping closer even as Blaine walked away.

"I am tough on you," he blurted out.

Blaine didn't stop, but he slowed, coming to a halt a few feet away from him, expression unreadable.

"This week, maybe, tougher than I should have been," he continued.  Drawing in a fortifying breath, he added, "And I need to apologize for that."

He had always been tough on Blaine.  Not because he hadn't liked him (although there were definitely times when Blaine's ridiculous attempts at dancing or singing or acting made him want to tear his own hair out), but because the entertainment industry was ruthless and Blaine's perpetual optimism about everything had been exhausting.  Blaine had needed a hearty dose of reality to shut him up, and if it had been Cooper to deliver it to him, then he'd been doing him a favor.

He had.

Still, if the cost was Blaine falling apart, Cooper couldn't tell if he had done him any favors at all.  And maybe Blaine would be fine on his own, and maybe he didn't need Cooper at all, but Cooper's feet were planted to the stage as if his life depended on it, and he knew that he didn't want Blaine to walk out of his life.

Blaine had been the one constant, the one guaranteed supporter that he had always had.  The thought of losing him - of losing his brother - was surprisingly difficult for him to swallow.

Watching him instead, he noticed that Blaine's back was tense, expectant.  Waiting for the other shoe to drop, maybe.

He was waiting for Cooper to tell him that he wasn't good enough, as he always had, unthinkingly, unquestioningly had, for years.

It was easy to be a critic and very, very hard to be an honest supporter.  And this - singing, performing, whatever it was - it was important to Blaine.  As annoying as it had been when they were kids and Cooper had wanted to focus on his career, his talents, he hadn't been able to ignore the fact that Blaine's imitations hadn't been purely to garner Cooper's attention.

He had genuinely enjoyed it.  And Cooper had shot him down selfishly, over and over, because it had been easier to see the imitation than it was to see the individual.

Cooper knew why Blaine was wary, in that moment; painfully aware of the catch that must be coming.

So Cooper defied Blaine's expectations and took a step forward, and surprising himself with his own sincerity as he said, "But it's only because I see -- and I've always seen -- how insanely talented you are."

Blaine stared at him, and Cooper could almost see the curiosity unfolding in his gaze, the desperate, aching need to be accepted just under the surface.

Cooper knew how to read faces.  Maybe he'd never known his brother half as much as he thought he had, but he knew how to read faces, and he could see the hope warring with the trepidation.

So he put it to rest as he said seriously, "I want you to be as successful as you can be, Blaine, and you will be.  You're gonna do it all.  Movies, concerts -- Broadway."

Blaine's expression shifted, his tone deadpan as he said, "Even though it's -- dead?"  The words seemed strange, coming from Blaine, and it took Cooper a moment to see that Blaine wasn't saying what he thought; he was parroting what Cooper would have said five, ten years ago in a moment of careless spite, thoughtless exasperation.

You have to be born into Broadway, Blaine, you can't just become a Broadway performer.  Broadway is dead, anyway.

So he leaned forward and insisted, "You'll resurrect it."

And Blaine would - through sheer force of will, if nothing else - because that was the person that Blaine had become in Cooper's absence.

Blaine had become a fighter, refusing to let their father or Dalton or public school or any of it beat him down again, because he had aspirations, still, and dreams and desires and a boyfriend that Cooper had never known about, and he was too determined to let it crush him.

Try though he might, Cooper couldn't have crushed that out.  And it pained him to realize that, even after all that time, Blaine still wanted him back.  After all the unflinching criticism and years apart, Blaine still wanted Cooper in his life.

And in that moment, Cooper resolved to be worthy of that level of commitment.

"And when I'm in the audience watching you," he said, stepping forward so he could wrap an arm around Blaine's shoulders, pulling him into his fantasy instead of pushing him away, "I wanna be able to say, 'That's my kid-brother up there.  I helped him get there.'"

Blaine was quiet for a moment, almost bashful under the praise.  "Thanks for saying that, Coop," he said at last.  "And I know you really mean it, too, because â€¦ you weren't pointing your finger at me--" he jabbed Cooper lightly in the chest to demonstrate as Cooper rolled his eyes and walked off with his best oh fuck you Blainers expression in place, unable to stop the grin from forming as Blaine added, voice pitchy with the sudden jump, "- or speaking REALLY LOUDLY to be INTENSE."

Laughing, Cooper stepped back, waiting for him to speak.

He wasn't expecting the amount of raw emotion in Blaine's voice as he said, "I'm really glad we could sing together one last time before you left to be Mr. Hollywood."

Cooper was about to tell him that being Mr. Hollywood was harder than it looked and he would be sure to send Blaine an autographed picture of him and Michael Bay as soon as possible before he hesitated.

Don't you dare, he warned himself, because minor role or not, it was still a role, and he needed to get back to LA for recording for the next six months before he lost sight of his goal.

He'd given up a guest star role on NCIS once because of a phone call in the middle of the night.

Maybe it was fate that made him say, quite possibly the most selfless lie he ever told: "Actually, my audition got cancelled." 

And as he scrambled for an excuse to explain why he hadn't gotten cast in the movie when he was perfect for the role (which he was, and he had been, and God, if he didn't regret this in the morning, he really would be crazy), he couldn't regret the way Blaine's expression fell with sympathy before brightening as he formulated a plan to help him send in another audition tape.

There would always be another movie, another role, another chance.

But he only had one kid-brother, and he wasn't about to waste him while he still wanted him in his life.

"So, how much do you think it'll piss Dad off if I stick around another week or two?" he asked, arm around Blaine's shoulder as they walked down the hallway together.  Maybe he could work at a strip club for a couple nights to make up the lost time; after all, he wasn't ashamed of his body and it paid well.  Best of all, it would probably still make Blaine punch him in the shoulder with an exasperated sigh and a no, you should not work at a strip club just to make extra money.  He kind of missed that, too; getting under Blaine's skin not to make him mad but to make him smile.

He hadn't seen Blaine smile like that in a long time.  It was nice, nicer than he'd been expecting, and it made him doubly determined to make up for lost time when Blaine almost stumbled over his own feet in surprise.

"You're staying?"

"Just for a couple weeks," Cooper replied.  "Any longer and I think I'd give Dad an aneurysm."

Blaine rolled his eyes, an amused huff of laughter startling out of him.  "Yeah, you would," he agreed.  "But -- you're really staying?"

"I'm really staying," Cooper assured, squeezing Blaine's shoulders lightly.  "Someone has to keep you out of trouble.  I mean, boxing?  Really?"

Blaine's expression darkened briefly with something unreadable before returning to a forcibly bright smile as he said, "Yeah, it's -- sort of a long story." 

"I've got time," Cooper said, and he meant it, for once, as he followed Blaine out to his car and listened to him talk about all that had happened in four years.

Maybe he hadn't been the big brother that he should have been, but he'd learned that he didn't need to be perfect for Blaine to love him.

He just needed to be there, on his side, ready to listen come hell or high water, and Blaine would inevitably do the same.

**Author's Note:**

> P.S. Please let me know if there are any weird coding errors in the fic! I did my best to weed them out before publication, but some will inevitably slip through the cracks.


End file.
